Моя Правда

Dear Russia,
I just had an inspirational talk with Justin and it inspired me to write a blog that came more from the heart. So here I go. Firstly, I want to thank my friends that are on this trip with me (Justin and Hannah especially). I could not be happier that I have friends that dedicate any moment they can to their own self improvement. We have seen each other’s lows, and now we’re beginning to see each other’s highs, and soon, I’m sure, we’ll be seeing each other’s lows once again. It’s motivated and driven friends like these that I have always tried to surround myself around, friends that remind me that it isn’t about only the high’s and the low’s—and that friendship is not based on them either. I appreciate that they have never given me an excuse for sucking in class and instead they inspire me to work harder by simply allowing the process of “sucking” to be experienced—they recognize that the process is what’s important—and chocolate and cookies and a weekend night of mischief. Thanks for all that.
Ok. Alexander Rezalin AKA Sasha—is my acting teacher here at MXAT. I believe that sometimes I learn just as much about acting from watching him teach acting than actually getting up and doing it. Sasha is a man who gives more heart, soul and energy than one could think possible—enough to shed a tear sometimes. At one point during a scene in class, as he looked directly in the eyes of a student, he emphatically said, “I am your teacher...and YOU are my Student…and I want to give YOU…EVERYTHING… that I have…(pause)…” Of course this is much more beautiful when you understand that this man may have been dying inside only because he was searching for any ONE way to communicate ONE THOUGHT—and it was all that much more heartbreaking because he was doing it in his broken (yet improving) English. What a barrier language can be when trying to communicate—whether you speak that same language or not. There is something in this moment that I feel I cannot explain accurately enough. What is noticeable in Sasha is that he demands EVERYTHING from us as well…and we want to give it to him. It’s not a demand in the sense that it is unfair—in fact it is expected and even unquestioned. In fact, if you can imagine a world where the word “expected” didn’t exist—that would be what we must do. Oh yes! Here’s the word—we must be.
One can tell that Sasha has many sleepless night toiling over how to inspire his students into a state of enlightenment. He doesn’t let down, nor does he probably get much sleep. However, Sasha’s passion is only one example of the passion that I witness on a daily basis. We have Anatoly Smeliansky who every week deeply delves into his Russian culture and brings out what he believes is the core of the Russian people—the core of their passion and drive to move forward. Each show he sends us to has some deeper meaning—he doesn’t send us to see a deconstructed IVANOV simply to sit down and enjoy a play. He’s allowing us to experience Russian Theatre History in the making. Chekhov has been a celebrated writer for nearly 150 years now and he sends us to a play where this classical play has been completely deconstructed—It’s like seeing Oedipus Rex or Hamlet done backwards and half of the scenes cut out. He’s teaching us something about art—that art is much more than just us—what his lesson is though I’m still attempting to find out. He said something quite brilliant the other day, “Chekhov doesn’t care what you do to his play. His play will always live on—it’s in the library and that can’t be changed.” Then he explained, “Don’t worry—everything will be the same as it was before—This is the drama of Chekhov.”
With all this in mind, with all the wealth of information that splatters against my body every day, one could say that I have obviously learned many many many things in Russia. I’ve learned about Russian history, I’ve learned about acting theory and practice, I’ve learned about body control, I’ve learned what it is to experience a DaVinci, Rafaello,and Machaelangello painting, and I’ve even learned that how to cook some tasty Russian food—but all this profound knowledge has come stems from one thing… an individual passion for life and the pursuit of something greater than ourselves. I believe that theatre is powerful, and fortunately for me I’ve never believed it more in my life and I think it’s worth the sleepless nights, it’s worth being self-conscious, it’s worth suffering, it’s worth being misunderstood, and it’s worth being humiliated for just the chance to give someone one moment of honest life. One would be enough—Brecht believed that one play could solve all the world problems—so can acting.
Hannah and I were once sitting in class and we saw Sasha’s bag open. In his bag there was an opened box of assorted chocolates and an English to Russian dictionary... We just smiled at each other and then continued to watch Sasha work.